Onwards
by LovelyBullet
Summary: Can Malfoy redeem himself with one act of bravery? Is the little girl with the necklace as innocent as she appears? What if, in haste to destroy Voldemort the Order overlooked something very important?


**AN** Hello everyone! Here is what will hopefully be the first chapter to a multichapter story. My portrayal of some of the characters are a bit...different than most are accustomed to, but are by no means the most far fetched that I've seen on this site. Anyway, hope you enjoy! Input it always so incredibly appreciated.

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"Please! Please!" The strangled voice wailed, "Just let me go! We're supposed to be at peace!" Harry ducked behind the corner, crouching down to ensure his feet were hidden away.

"Just let me help you!" A darker voice growled out. The girl let out a wordless shriek. Certain that the cloak concealed his entire body, Harry peeked around the corner and down the stairs into the hall below, pulling out his wand in the process.

There was the confrontation. A body — the girl — lay on the floor with a leg stuck out at an awkward angle while another body — the man with the deep dark voice — crouched above her with his wand stuck against her chest. The man had grabbed the girls good leg and was pinning it to the floor while he pinned one of her arms with his knee and warded off her other with his wand elbow. Harry pulled out his wand, ready for his final act, Harry decided that saving this girl would be his final act and pulled out his wand. Before he could act, however, the evildoer, who Harry now saw to be a dirty blonde, cast his curse.

The curse was unlike any Harry had ever seen. The girl shuddered and shrieked, but only once. _If it were the Cruciatus she would still be writhing._ Harry watched, horror struck as the curse spread over the girl. He watched its white glow pulsed around her chest and spread to her extremities. He had seen countless monstrosities during the past few hours, but this was the first time Harry was rendered unable to act.

The glow of the curse continued to beat around her chest and her injured leg, but faded from the rest of her body. The girl made no noise, in fact, Harry thought he heard her sigh. _Was she dead? Had this unknown curse killed her?_ A minute passed and Harry was regaining his strength, preparing to attack.

"You…you healed me?" A female voice, so different from that of the distressed girl earlier, spoke quietly from below, "But why?"

"It doesn't matter why." The male voice, now a familiar voice, spoke, "Hurry on now. Your friends and family will be waiting for you." The girl sprung to her feet and ran off, not sparing her attacker-now-savior a second glace. _He healed her._

Although the girl had fled, the man stayed. Kneeling on the ground and resting his weight on his heels, the man's identity was entirely hidden from the man on the level below. Harry decided to take a chance and kept quietly down the staircase separating him from the other man. Before Harry could take another step, the man spun around on his knees and thrust his wand forward in a single motion.

Harry felt his cloak ripped from him and his body paralyzed as he gazed into the eyes of Draco Malfoy.

"Potter." Draco spoke without any inflection. The blonde allowed his wand and the spell it cast to drop. In an entirely un-Draco like motion, he bent down and picked up the invisibility cloak that had fallen between the two and offered it to Harry. The two men stared at the peace offering, now secure in Harry's arms, until Malfoy scoffed, "Of course you'd have one of those cloaks. They were the only thing father's money couldn't buy." Despite his words, his voice held no malice.

"What are you doing here, Malfoy?" Harry bit, not buying the nice guy routine.

"I could ask you the same, but I already know the answer." The boys fell into silence again, "You know it'll make no difference, right? He's just going to slaughter them all."

"If I let him kill me he might leave them alone or at least kill fewer people. If I stay and people fight on he will kill every last one of them." Harry forced himself to believe his own words. He felt the need to justify his actions to someone, even if to his childhood nemesis.

"Saint Potter, sacrificing himself for the masses. If it weren't a futile sacrifice I'd say it was noble of you. Make no mistake. He. Will. Kill. Them. Even if you give yourself up. He will kill all the people you love. He will kill the Weasleys, Ron and Ginny and George. He will kill Hermione." Malfoy paused, "If you go now you will die and then they will all die. You **then** them. Not you **or** them." None of this was news to Harry. Although he told himself he was doing it to protect his friends and family, a small but loud part of his brain yelled for him to die before them so as not to witness their demise. Another part of his brain marvelled over Malfoy's lack of insulting nicknames and that he actually knew their given names.

"It's all I can do. It's the last thing I can do for them." Harry sighed, draping his cloak around his shoulders.

"You're a fool Potter." Malfoy stuck out his hand. "Best of luck."

He looked at the hand with shock and distrust, but Harry shook it. Harry pulled the cloak over his head and made the worst mistake of his life. Before he disappeared into the darkness he turned back.

Although Harry was almost completely encased by the night's darkness, Malfoy's figure stood, alone in the Entrance Hall, visible to anyone who cared to look. His almost-white hair hung around his face, dirty, like the rest of him, with the grime from battle. His left pant leg was torn revealing a long cut trailing from his knee to upper thigh where it continued past where Harry was able to observe. His once white shirt was stained with blood, a deep red in some places and a faint pink in others, but there was no white left. Harry looked into the eyes of his childhood tormentor. Much like his own, Malfoy's eyes has aged far past their biological age, holding a dark knowledge that very few people were unlucky enough to hold. Hermione was smart and wise, but she believed the best in people. The war had stomped that quality out of both men - for that's what war had made these two barely-of-age wizards - leaving them still intelligent but without hope for the goodness of man and wizard kind.

"Just, if you see the chance, kill the snake." Harry pulled the cloak tighter around his body and disappeared into the night. Off to die.

"Who's that? That Hagrid's carrying? Ron? Who is that?" The red headed girl with the dirt smudge on her nose.

Then the being without a nose decreed, "Harry Potter is dead!" Voldemort basked in the cries of distress, beating back any attacks with a few simple flicks of the wrist. "From this day forth . . . you'll put your faith in me. Harry Potter is dead! And now it is the time to declare yourself. Come forward and join us . . ." he scanned the overwhelmingly young crowd, "Draco, please join us." The snake man extended his arm to the young man.

Draco felt every set of eyes flicker to him where he stood in the back of the courtyard, partially hidden behind a broken pillar. He had hoped he would be left unnoticed. Clearly too much to ask. Thousands of thoughts flickered through the blonde's head, scenarios of cowardly self-preservation and of heroic attacks. Only the high and disconnected voice of his aunt could break through his spell, "They killed your parents Draco. Your dearest father and your darling mother." Her voice was eerily calm until it swelled into a roaring rage, "They killed your parents Draco! While they were searching for you! Come to me, to your family, your only family! It's just me now!"

Malfoy took a step forward. And then another. One foot in front of the other until he crossed into the no man's land. "Ah and Draco, while you're at it, grab that hat from the sniveling fool over there." The snake-man beckoned Draco onwards. Malfoy did as he was told, obtaining the sorting hat from Neville, refusing to look his classmate in the eye, before crossing to stand beside his aunt, just behind the Dark Lord. "Any other volunteers?"

Longbottom stepped forward and delivered what Draco assumed was an inspirational speech about rallying the troops around Harry's sacrifice, but Draco did not hear a word of it. He was too busy staring at the hilt of a sword that was now sticking out of the hat in his left hand. Malfoy allowed his head to pivot from the side he just deserted to the body lying limp in the half-giant's arms.

Everything went silent. Malfoy had tunnel vision as his head swiveled back to Voldemort and then to the snake just beside him. Draco felt his hand grip the sword, felt him unsheathe the weapon and brandish it. With something akin to a battle cry, Malfoy took two quick steps forward and brought his sword down, separating the snake's head from the rest of its body. _Kill the snake. This make us even now, Potter?_

For a fraction of a moment, the courtyard was silent and still. All faces, both dark and light held the same shocked expression. Only for a moment. The courtyard plunged into chaos. Voldemort screamed before casting a giant ring of fire around himself and pushing it out, sending all Order and friends flying backward into the castle. Voldemort spun on Malfoy, ready to punish the boy for unknowingly killing his final horcrux. Malfoy refused to cower in fear as the monster raised his wand with the deadly curse ready to spill from his lips. Draco stared the Dark Lord right in the eyes as he cast his spell.

"PROTEGO!" a voice yelled from behind.

"Harry!" Voices in front of Draco yelled, "He's alive! Harry!" But Draco was too busy staring into a pair of green eyes for the second time that night.

"I guess I missed a third option!" Draco yelled as to two boys ran into the castle where the battle had begun anew, "It can be neither you nor them."

Draco sat entirely alone in the Great Hall. There was music and laughter. People rejoiced at the end of the war. Harry was surrounded by his avid adorers and Ron had his family. Even Pansy sat in another room with her parents, chained and guarded but still together. Only Draco sat alone. At the end of one of the long tables. With meters of space between him and the next grouping. Having been the person to vanquish the snake no one kicked him out or locked him up, but no one would approach him. He leaned back against the table, allowing his eyelids to droop and hoping for a peaceful sleep.

"Do you have any idea what you did back there?" He opened just a single eye. There stood the brains behind the operation, the mud-muggleborn, "With the snake, that is." He only shrugged, "Why did you did it?"

"Potter told me to." He stated matter-of-factly.

"So you did it?" She arched her less-than-bushy eyebrow.

"Seems to have worked out for you lot." He opened his second eye and glanced knowingly around the hall.

The girl pulled up one side of her mouth into a contented smile, "I suppose it has." She turned to leave him alone once more, but instead turned back to him, "And Malfoy, you've got a bit of dirt on your shirt. Better get that cleaned, I know how you hate that." Her smile widened before she finished her retreat.

Malfoy finally looked down at himself. He was, indeed, a mess.

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Either make this Bellatrix. Might not work, but could. Harry would be in front of Malloy. Also could have a dark cloud at his feet that he had failed to notice.


End file.
